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T O P I C R E V I E W

Robert Pearlman

NASA update

First Expedition 24 spacewalk to begin Monday night

Cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Mikhail Kornienko will exit the International Space Station Monday night for a six-hour spacewalk. The pair will emerge from the Pirs docking compartment and work outside the Zarya FGB and Zvezda service modules.

This will be the first Expedition 24 spacewalk. NASA TV coverage begins at 10:00 p.m. CDT (0400 GMT July 27). The spacewalk is set to begin at 10:45 p.m. and end around 4:40 a.m. CDT on July 27.

They will outfit the Rassvet module's Kurs automated rendezvous system, install cables and remove and replace a video camera.

Kurs is the Russian radio telemetry system that enables automated dockings of unmanned spacecraft such as the Progress resupply vehicle.

The new video camera will document the rendezvous and docking of future Automated Transfer Vehicles to the aft end of the Zvezda service module.

On Friday, Yurchikhin and Kornienko put on their Orlan spacesuits and performed a dry run of the spacewalk activities. From inside the Pirs docking compartment they checked out the Orlan systems, practiced translation movements and tested their mobility.

The next spacewalk will take place Aug. 5 with Flight Engineers Tracy Caldwell Dyson and Doug Wheelock. The astronauts will exit the Quest airlock and install a Portable Data Grapple Fixture (PDGF) on the Zarya module extending the reach of Canadarm2, the station's robotic arm. They also will jettison old multi-layer insulation removed for the PDGF install and mate power connectors to Zarya.

The cosmonauts, both wearing Russian Orlan spacesuits with blue stripes, are scheduled to outfit the Rassvet mini-research module for the Kurs automated rendezvous system and replace a video camera on the Zvezda service module.

This is the 25th Russian and the 147th spacewalk overall in support of station assembly and maintenance.

Kornienko is making his first spacewalk and Yurchikhin is performing his fourth. Yurchikhin's first three spacewalks occurred while he was commander of Expedition 15 in 2007.

The spacewalkers are working outside the Zvezda service module 10 years to the day after its addition to the International Space Station.

The cosmonauts successfully outfitted the Rassvet module for the Kurs automated rendezvous system, as well as routed and mated command and data handling cables on the Zvezda service module and Zarya functional cargo block modules.

A video camera was removed and replaced on the aft end of Zvezda, which the ground then successfully tested. The old camera was safely jettisoned by the cosmonauts away from the International Space Station.

During the spacewalk, two objects were detected floating away from the station. One was tentatively identified as a cable clamp, left outside the station from a previous Russian spacewalk. That object and another, not conclusively identified, both departed well below the vicinity of the complex and pose no threat to the orbiting laboratory.